Kathy Azari has done her best to provide instruments, from asking the school district for what help if can give to doing fundraisers to instrument drives to exploring thrift stores and asking community members for their old instruments.

She’ll take almost anything, except accordions, though she said she’s had a couple tossed at her during instrument drives. But she and Vanessa Neri feel their students deserve the chance to play, so some students share instruments and they repair instruments as best as they can.

[swift-infobox title=”To help”]To donate instruments or funds for instrument repairs to Brentwood Middle School, or for more information about the school’s music program, call (970) 348-3000.[/swift-infobox]

With more than 70 percent of students needing free and reduced lunch at the school, simply renting instruments is impossible for many families, let alone buying an instrument, which can cost thousands.

Here’s why getting instruments in the hands of Brentwood students is so important:

Principal Nicole Petersen told touring school and legislative officials this month the school is beating the odds. Since 2016 the school moved off of the second-lowest state rating to the highest. She attributes some of that success to the number of students in music: more than 90 percent.

Music and academic success

Armando Perez, an eighth-grader at Brentwood, said the person who gave him their old trumpet to play told him playing music would help him in math. His grades, indeed, have improved, and he said he feels more confident.

Before the Brentwood was designated an International Baccalaureate school, Azari said classes such as band often came second to remedial classes for students who were struggling academically. By making time for both in students’ schedules, she and Petersen said they agree students perform better academically.

But Azari, Neri and Petersen believe music does more than sharpen their brain. It increases their confidence, just as athletics does.

“It empowers them to believe in themselves,” Petersen said.

In those music classes, most start with no experience. They all grow together, and can often see results within the first couple of weeks of playing their instrument or singing in choir.

That gives them a feeling of success, Petersen said, even if they aren’t doing well in any of their other classes. Once they know they can do well in one area – with hard work, of course – their confidence in themselves helps them do better in other classes.

Some students at Brentwood are learning English as a second language and feel discouraged sometimes by the challenges they face learning a second language in addition to the math, social studies and other subjects they study.

Music, Neri said, is a universal language, so choir or band is one way to leave those frustrations behind. In fact, in choir, the songs are in a wide variety of languages.

Neri is planning to start a Mariachi band at the school, and Jenny Nunuz, a seventh-grader at Brentwood, could hardly contain her excitement. Nunuz said the option to play in a Mariachi band would make her extra thrilled to go to school.

“It’s big part of Mexican culture,” she said.

Neri and Azari take a lot of joy in watching students’ faces light up when they get to hold an instrument for the first time, something many may have thought they’d never get the chance to do.

– Emily Wenger is the parents reporter for the Greeley Tribune, covering education in Weld County and answering as many questions parents have as she can. You can reach her at (970) 392-4468 or ewenger@greeleytribune.com or on Twitter at @emilylwenger.